


Good Days Rarely Leave Scars

by aflawedfashion



Category: Defiance (TV)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Fluff and mild angst, Post-Series, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-18
Updated: 2017-05-18
Packaged: 2018-11-02 01:08:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10933824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aflawedfashion/pseuds/aflawedfashion
Summary: A Saturday morning between Nolan and Amanda where they muse about scars, dangerous lifestyles, and morning sex. (Contains sexual situations but not quite up to an M rating)





	Good Days Rarely Leave Scars

**Author's Note:**

> As always, my post-season 3 fic takes the assumption that Nolan came back because he always comes back, and I reject any other option. I have written his return in [ They Don't Have Scotch on Omec Ships](http://archiveofourown.org/works/7968229), but that is not required to read before this. Just know he came back and finally got together with Amanda.

Amanda knew that Nolan had nearly forgotten about the pale scar that permanently marked the side of his forehead. When he looked at his reflection in the mirror, he noticed every new gray hair that appeared in his beard and he sighed as the dark circles under his eyes demanded sleep he had no time for, but that scar was practically invisible to him. It meant nothing more than a freckle on his nose, an inconsequential feature of his face.

Compared to the scars that adorned his torso, it truly was nothing. It had faded over the years, and the story behind it didn't haunt him. A few headaches and an unconscious brush with death meant little to a man who had been to war and had his life threatened daily while living in the badlands. It was Amanda who hated to look at that little scar, Amanda who had to deal with having her brutal memories painted on the face of the man she loved.

Amanda could never forget the way her heart pounded in her chest and her stomach flipped as Nolan collapsed on the ground in front of her only seconds after she had kissed him on the cheek. The smile was still on his face as he started stumbling backwards like he hadn't yet realized what was happening to him. Even as she slept beside him years after he'd recovered, images of Nolan’s seizing body played through her mind if she stared at that scar too long, if she let her thoughts wander back in time. 

She would never forget that day. 

She would never forget feeling that helpless.

He had nearly died in her arms, and there was nothing she could do to save him. She had held his head in her lap as Samir sped Nolan's car towards Defiance in a race against time for his life. Running her hands through his hair, she had pleaded with him to wake up, but he didn't. All she could do was sit with him as she wiped away the tears that fell from her eyes onto his face. 

As tears threatened to form in Amanda’s eyes once again with the strength of the memory, Nolan shifted in his sleep and her eyes moved from his temple to the rough, irregular scars adorning his bare chest. Those scars were mementos of his former life. They held stories he could hardly bring himself to tell her out of shame, but she knew how bad those stories were. Amanda didn't delude herself. She knew he had done things that would make her sick to her stomach, things he regretted. 

Those scars and the stories behind them were objectively worse than the thin mark on his temple, but she didn't care about them, not really. Everyone had a past, but it was the present that mattered to Amanda. The man who slept in her bed, the man who would die for his daughter and who fought for his town, that was the man she loved. 

Amanda was surrounded by people who had fought in a long, horrifying war, but that war was over, and she had to give those people a chance at living a real life. Nolan was her most important proof that she wasn't foolish to do so. If she had never trusted him with a badge, she would never have experienced one of the most fulfilling relationships of her life. She would never have known what it felt like to wake up with him beside her every day. She would never have learned to believe in romantic love again.

A bird chirped, and Amanda's eyes darted from Nolan's chest to the open window.

“Is it really morning already?” Nolan asked through a yawn, blinking the sleep out of his eyes. 

“Yes, but it’s Saturday.” Amanda pressed a slow, lingering kiss to his shoulder as she ran her hand delicately across his bare chest, her fingers barely grazing his skin. “You don’t have to do anything. You don't even have to get out of bed.” 

“Exactly why this is my favorite day,” he said as he wrapped his arm around her and pulled her against his body.

“Mine too.” Her voice was barely above a whisper as she lifted her uncovered leg over his body, her fingertips drawing circles on his chest.

“A whole day with nothing to do.”

“No meetings.”

“No paperwork.”

A devious smile played across Amanda’s lips. “I just can't even imagine how we'll fill  _ all _ that time.”

Without needing to say another word, Nolan wrapped his arms around her back, lifting her off the bed and holding her tightly in his arms. A surprised giggle escaped her lips as his strong hands kept her from falling backwards.

“I love you,” she whispered, placing her hands on his neck, caressing his skin with her thumbs.

“I love you too.” He pressed a kiss to her lips before planting a trail of slow, deliberate kisses along her jaw.

Amanda slid her hands down Nolan's body, eliciting a low moan from deep within him that sent a wave of electricity through her body. She pulled off her panties and pushed him down against the bed, tugging his boxers off his hips as she climbed on top of him.

“You’re amazing,” he said, bringing his hands around her waist, shifting his hips to meet hers. Amanda closed her eyes, ready to give herself to him when his thumb rested on the scar that ran across her abdomen, and she gasped unexpectedly.

“Wait.” Even as she said the word that would bring her morning of sex to a crashing halt before it began, she didn't fully understand why she said it.

“What’s wrong?” He was breathless, his words slow.

“Does it bother you?” 

Nolan let out a dry, confused laugh. “Trust me, Amanda, nothing about this bothers me.” 

“I'm serious.” She dropped to the bed beside him as she placed her hand on his chest, urging him to answer her question.

“So am I.” He took a deep, calming breath. “I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.”

“This scar.” She guided his fingers across the raised mark on her abdomen.

He furrowed his brow in confusion as his fingers continued stroking the scar. “It doesn’t make you any less attractive if that’s what you’re asking.” 

“It's not about vanity.” She lay down beside him, curling herself against him until they were so close that their noses nearly touched. “But thank you.” 

“Does it bother  _ you _ ?”

“Honestly, no.”

“So why are we talking about this instead of having sex?”

“Because…” she shook her head slightly, trying to gather her words. “Because this bothers me.” She placed her hand on the side of Nolan's face, her fingers stroking his scar. “It reminds me you're mortal, and I'm tired of looking at it. I don't want to be reminded of that fact every day when your job, the job I gave you, has you chasing after people with weapons pointed at you.”

“Is that really what you think about when you look at me?”

“Not always, but every time you do something exceptionally stupid, yeah, it is.”

“Amanda, I’m fine. I know what I'm doing.”

“Right now you're fine, but how many brushes with death do you have in you? How many do I have? How long before this whole fantasy we’re living comes crashing down?”

Almost before she finished her question, Nolan kissed her, slowly yet passionately, saying more with the electricity that sizzled between them than he ever could ever say with words alone. That feeling was real. Their lives were so much more than a fantasy.

“I know.” She let out a breath, exhausted with by her own mind’s inability to let go of all her fears and worries. “But Nolan, last week you got in a fight with a bioman. Again.”

“And I won.” He smirked with pride. “Again.”

“A month ago I got held at gunpoint.”

“Yes, but in my experience, people who hold you at gunpoint rarely actually plan to shoot you. They just want us to give in to their demands.”

“Which we almost never do.”

“And yet we always survive.”

“Nolan, we aren't living in a game.”

“I know that.” 

“Sometimes I don't think you do.”

“I promise I do.” The last hint of his smile faded from his face. “I admit I can be reckless, I get in too many fights with biomen, and I don't always make the smartest choices when it comes to my own safety, but I know what it's like to worry. I'm terrified every time I see someone pull a gun on you, and I know the scars on our bodies are signs that we can't protect each other from this world we live in, but I take comfort in knowing that you have consistently survived injuries and fights that most people wouldn't. I  _ need _ to believe you will survive whatever takes you on next, and I need to have a sense of humor about it because if all I had was the fear, it would be crushing.”

“We’d never leave this bed.”

“No, we wouldn't, but we have to, and I survived Votan tech growing in my brain just like you survived taking a knife to the gut. We have survived this long, and we will keep surviving.”

“We barely survived,” she whispered, struggling to hold his gaze, but refusing to look away.

“That's true.” He paused, taking her hands and holding them to his chest. “But that's all it takes, and the way I see it, that scar isn't a sign of your frail human existence. It's a sign of just how fucking strong you really are. That wound should have killed you, but it didn't because nothing, nothing at all, can stop Amanda Rosewater.”

“Or Joshua Nolan.” She said the words with a wavering smile. As her eyes focused on his scar, she tried to convince herself that what he said was true, that the mark was a sign of survival, not weakness. “Maybe you're right, but I still don't want to look at it. I don't want to think about the bad memories.”

“Then don't. Think about the good memories.” His thumb stroked the side of her hand as he spoke. “Think about the days we caught the bad guys, not the days they caught us.”

“I think I'd rather remember the days we practically emptied my liquor cart and sang Taylor Swift songs.” She pictured them sitting on the cold floor of her office on a warm night, arguing over lyrics they wished they could google as scotch sloshed from their glasses. “Those were good days.”

“Sure,” Nolan held up his hand, “you can think about those days all you want, but you cannot speak of them.”

Amanda ignored his protests as her mind wandered back into her favorite memories. “Or the days we spent lying in bed together, days like today.”

“Now  _ those _ are the days we should remember for the rest of our lives.”

“They are.” Amanda spoke slowly, her brain foggy with happy memories. “I just wish it wasn't only the bad days that left scars to remember them by. Having sex all morning doesn't leave scars.” Amanda grimaced, tilting her head to the side as another memory flashed through her mind. “Unless I fall in the shower.”

“And then we have to explain to Doc Yewll exactly why we're both soaking wet on a bright sunny day, and you're in desperate need of stitches.”

“God,” Amanda hung her head, hiding the blush she could feel burning at her cheeks, “I hope I never,  _ ever _ have to do that again.”

“You should get a bigger shower.”

“I can't just get a bigger shower. Every update to this building comes out of the town budget. What exactly would I put on the maintenance request - that my shower is too small for two middle aged people to have sex in safely, so I need them to build me a new one?”

“Yes, exactly that.” Nolan lifted himself up onto his elbows. “Please put that on a maintenance request.”

“No,” Amanda practically snorted.

“Can I?”

“Noooooo.”

“Fine.” Nolan shrugged, falling back on the bed. “Beds are more comfortable anyway.”

“And days spent having sex in a warm bed don't leave scars.”

“Well…” Nolan scrunched up his face as he playfully tilted his head to the side. “Depends on your idea of fun in bed, I mean, your sister was a prostitute and you did work in the NeedWant. You must-”

“Stop.”

A disobedient grin spread across his face. “You must know that some people enjoy-”

“No, nope, stop talking.” Amanda shook her head, placing a finger over his lips to silence him. “I knew what I said as soon as I said it. Don't, just don't say anything more about that. Calamari burns and shallow knife wounds are not my kind of fun.”

Nolan laughed without any malice, but Amanda desperately wished she could rewind time to say something else. 

“You know, there are ways to mark memories on your body that don't involve terrifying or humiliating trips to the doctor.” He tapped his fingers against the EMC logo on his shoulder. “We could get tattoos to commemorate this very important occasion.”

“To commemorate what? Morning sex?”

“I like that idea.” Nolan nodded slowly. “I  _ very _ much like that idea, but I'd also like to remind you that we haven't had sex yet. I was actually thinking that we could get one tattoo that would commemorate  _ all _ of the good days that deserve to be remembered so much more than the bad ones that kicked our asses and left scars we didn’t ask for.”

Amanda glanced to the side, considering the idea. “We can still have the sex first, right?”

“No.” 

“What?” she practically gasped.

“I’m kidding.” He brought his hand around her back, pressing her hips against his. “I just like to keep you on your toes.”

It worked. It always worked. “Just shut up and kiss me.”

“Yes, ma’am.”  
  



End file.
